Patea & Waverley Press FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14th, 1921. DEPARTMENTAL ECONOMY.

Patea Mail, Volume XLV, 14 October 1921, Page 2

Patea & Waverley Press FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14th, 1921. DEPARTMENTAL ECONOMY.

IX spite oi‘ the fact that economy is being urged on the people by the Prime Minister and his colleagues, two Government Departments are launching' out and printing matter that could very well have been held over until the need for economy is less than it is to-day. The Education Department is setting a bad example in deciding to print a superfluous periodical ■whilst the Department of Industries and Commerce is now going one better by arranging to publish a “Manufacturers Directory” for New Zealand. At a time when economy should be the order of the day, a large staff is presumably engaged in the compilation of this work. One of the first things these officials have done has been to send out broadcast all over the country—to retail drapers amongst others—the following quaint circular: — .“It has frequently been brought to notice that goods which can bo produced in the Dominion arc purchased abroad because the buyer is not aware that the same can be manufactured locally. This Department desires to widen the local market for the products of New Zealand industries by bringing the 'manufacturer into close touch with the merchant and consumer. This can be done by obtaining a complete list of the manufacturers and the goods they produce, so that the Department may be able to answer the numerous enquiries which are being received as to whether certain goods are manufactured in the Dgminion. ami. if so, where they can be purchased. When the in formation is complete the question of whether it may not be desirable to publish that portion which is not confidential, in the form of a New Zealand Manufacturers’ Directory..will receive consideration. ”

A .stamped addressed envelope is enclosed foe reply so tin;’ with stationery and expensive ofih-’als engaged upon a mountain of lahour, which may bring forth a little mouse of a directory, the cost to the eountrv

may be imagined. There is at the present time far too much waste in connection with the preparation and printing of Government documents. The two publications we have mentioned could well be done without and in addition many thousands of pounds of the taxpayers’ money could be •aval by cutting down the issues T Hansard, and many of the volumes of Government statistics that are treated by the recipients of them for the most part as .aste paper. More money coidd be saved too by abolishing the collection of statistics from small traders that are continually bebig asked for and which when obtained are to all intents and purposes quite Avorthless. The New Zealand Drapers Federation has evidently realised this fact to the full for at a recent Council meeting it had the following remit for its consideration: — “It is advisable that the Government Statistical Department be approached regarding Iho law ‘liequiring a schedule of statistics to be supplied by small traders who operate socalled factories, as any honest attempt to ympply genuine lignrcs is almost impossible.” The grievance of the employer and the merchant is that the supplying of the useless information costs money that can ill be spared at the present juncture. Unlike Government departments, a business man engages just the staff he can employ profitably and no si’.ore. These officials have quite enough to do in performing their daily tasks without being set to compile a lot of useless information to enable an equally useless book to be compiled. The Manufacturers’ Directory is a piece of unnecessary extravagance that the country could wel 1 he spared. As one writer has very aptly pul it “This sort of nonsense has gone on quite long enough to the expense of the people of New Zealand.”